Вопрос 2. Homonymy. Classification of Homonyms.

Homonyms are words different in meaning but identical in sound or spelling, or both in sound and spelling.

The term “homonymy” is derived from Greek homos – “similar” and onoma – “name”, and thus expresses the sameness of name combined with the difference in meaning.

E.g.: bank, n. – a shore; bank, n. – an institution for receiving, lending, exchanging money. Ball, n. – a sphere, any spherical body; ball, n. – a large dancing party.

Classification of Homonyms.

Homonyms are distinguished into three types:

Homonyms are the same in sound and spelling are traditionally termed homonyms proper. E.g.: match, (n.) – a game, match, (n.) – thing is used for producing fire; right, (adj.) - in accordance with fact, reason, truth, right, (adj.) - the direction or position on the right side; spring, (n.) - the act or an instance of jumping or leaping, spring, (n.) - the season of the year.

Homonyms are the same in sound but different in spelling can be defined as homophones. E.g.: a piece (n.) – peace (n.); cent (n.) – sent (v.); sea (n.) - see (n.); week (n.) - weak (adj.); bean (n.) - been (v.).

Homographs are words with the same spelling but pronounced differently.

E.g. bow –[bau]- (v.) – to incline the head or body in salutation; bow – [bәu]- (n.) – a flexible strip of wood for propelling arrows; to lead [li:d ]-(v.) – to conduct on the way, go before to show the way, lead [led ]- (n.) – a heavy, rather soft metal.

A more detailed classification was given by I.V. Arnold. She classified only perfect homonyms and suggested four criteria of their classification: lexical meaning, grammatical meaning, basic forms and paradigms.

According to these criteria I.V. Arnold pointed out the following groups:

- homonyms identical in their grammatical meanings, basic forms and paradigms (a typical example or model of a word) and different in their lexical meanings, e.g. a board in the meanings a council and “a thin flat piece of wood”;

- homonyms identical in their grammatical meanings and basic forms, different in their lexical meanings and paradigms, e.g. to lie - lied - lied, and to lie - lay - lain;

- homonyms different in their lexical meanings, grammatical meanings, paradigms, but coinciding in their basic forms, e.g. light – lights, light – lighter – lightest;

- homonyms different in their lexical meanings, grammatical meanings, in their basic forms, but coinciding in one of the forms of their paradigms, e.g. a bit and bit (from “to bite”).

Professor A.I. Smirnitsky’s classification of homonyms.

Another classification was suggested by Professor A.I Smirnitsky. He added to Skeat’s classification one more criterion: grammatical meaning. He subdivided the group of perfect homonyms in Skeat’s classification into two types of homonyms: perfect which are identical in their spelling, pronunciation and their grammar form, and homoforms which coincide in their spelling and pronunciation but have different grammatical meaning. Accordingly, Professor A. I. Smirnitsky classified homonyms into two large classes: 1) full homonyms, 2) partial homonyms.

1) Full lexical homonyms are words which represent the same category of parts of speech and have the same paradigm.

E. g. match, n. — a game, a contest

match, n. — a short piece of wood used for producing fire

wren, n. — a member of the Women's Royal Naval Service

wren, n. — a bird

2) Partial homonyms are subdivided into three subgroups:

A. Simple lexico-grammatical partial homonyms are words which belong to the same category of parts of speech. Their paradigms have one identical form, but it is never the same form, as will be seen from the examples.

E. g. (to) found, v. and found, v. (Past Indef., Past Part. of to(find)

to lay, v. and lay, v. (Past Indef. of to lie)

to bound, v. and bound, v. (Past Indef., Past Part, of to (bind)

B. Complex lexico-grammatical partial homonyms are words of different categories of parts of speech which have one identical form in their paradigms.

E. g. rose, n. rose, v. (Past Indef. of to rise)

maid, n. and made, v. (Past Indef., Past Part, of to make)

left, adj. and left, v. (Past Indef., Past Part, of to leave)

bean, n. and been, v. (Past Part, of to be

one, num. and won, v. (Past Indef., Past Part, of to win

C. Partial lexical homonyms are words of the same category of parts of speech which are identical only in their corresponding forms.

E. g. to lie (lay, lain), v. and to lie (lied, lied), v.

to hang (hung, hung), v. and to hang (hanged, hanged), v.

to can (canned, canned) and (I) can (could).

 

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